HP Introduces New Storage Solutions

HP is announcing on Monday the general availability of the HP EVA P6000 storage appliance, the fifth generation of its Enterprise Virtual Array storage hardware line. Also at the HP Discover conference this week in Las Vegas, HP is introducing new storage hardware, software and services based on technology from recent acquisitions such as Left Hand Networks, IBRIX and 3Par.

The EVA P6000, which was available for early release to some customers in May, offers thin provisioning along with 8 Gigabit Fibre Channel, Fibre Channel over Ethernet and, for the first time ever in the EVA line, 10-Gbit iSCSI connectivity support.

HP touts improved capacity, performance, ease of use, energy efficiency and other advances over previous-generation EVAs, which HP first introduced 10 years ago.

HP sees new EVA opportunities in emerging geographic markets--in places like Brazil, Malaysia and elsewhere in the Far East--by customers who want storage that is simple, general-purpose and reliable, says Tom Joyce, VP of marketing, strategy and operations in HP’s storage business unit.

“We expect over the next couple of years that we’re going to get a very significant bump in our revenue with EVA because ... we see a lot of customers around the world that are buying a lot of infrastructure for the first time and think that this would be a perfect fit for them,” Joyce says. The EVA P6000 carries a starting list price of $18,993.

HP is also introducing this fall the X5000 G2 Network Storage System, targeted at midsize business customers, that was co-developed with Microsoft to run on Windows Storage Server software for network-attached storage (NAS) environments. The list price for the X9000 starts at $32,000. The E5000 introduced earlier this year supports Microsoft Exchange.Also new is the X9000 IBRIX Storage System for large utility-based file storage environments. The IBRIX system, which scales to more than 16 petabytes of storage capacity, is based on technology from HP’s 2009 acquisition of IBRIX, a maker of file management software. The X9000 will be available sometime this month starting at $89,500.

HP VirtualSystem is a new dashboard for provisioning and managing virtual environments, and is a companion to a previously released HP CloudSystem for cloud computing. VirtualSystem supports Microsoft Hyper-V, Citrix Xen and VMware virtual environments. Three variations of VirtualSystem are designed for small, midsize and large configurations. The small system pairs HP Proliant servers and storage virtualization software from LeftHand Networks, which HP acquired in 2008. The midsize solution pairs LeftHand software with HP BladeSystem servers, while the solution targeted at large configurations pairs BladeSystem and management software from 3Par, which HP acquired in September 2010 for $2.35 billion after a highly publicized bidding war with Dell.

HP has been active in acquiring key companies and integrating their technology into HP products, says Jeff Boles, an analyst with The Teneja Group, “almost to the point where it is difficult to step back and take it all in.It may be too early in the game to tell for sure whether HP is making the most of all of the pieces they have, but it looks like there is solid strategy and vision here.”

The continued development of the HP EVA storage line should assure legacy customers that HP will continue to support the platform for some time, he adds. The EVA line has a reputation for delivering low-cost and reliable storage technology, but it has fallen behind competitors in delivering new features, such as thin provisioning, which it has now added to the fifth generation product.

“While the actual use of thin provisioning on the data center floor is still in early adoption phases by the enterprise, it has become a de facto checklist requirement for new storage purchases,” Boles wrote in an e-mail interview.

See more on this topic by subscribing to Network Computing Pro Reports Strategy: HP Matrix (subscription required).